


Burning Airships

by Fitzfire



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-06
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-09-28 15:01:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10123289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fitzfire/pseuds/Fitzfire
Summary: Eren is running from his past, and he doesn't expect to have a future. But when he comes to live in one of the most impoverished cities in the country, he meets two people that might be able to show him a way to continue living.





	1. The Filth of Amoria

**Author's Note:**

> This chapter is packed full of descriptions and imagery. It's necessary to set the scene. Don't worry though, there will be a lot more dialogue and eremin in the coming chapters!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren arrives in Amoria and meets a strange woman. The city reveals it's true colors.

1

Eren’s eyes fluttered open.

The day was overcast. Snow dropped down lightly onto the thin blanket of white that lay over him like a veil. He was completely numb.

“You could have died.”

Someone was kneeling over him.

Moving was difficult. He’d fallen asleep in a sitting position, propped up against a building. The narrow alleyway cast shadows over both Eren and the women leaning over him. He turned his head slightly, taking in the coat of gray and brown slush covering the gutters and narrow dirt roads. In fact, the only white that could be seen was the snow on his body and the whites of the women’s eyes.

The place he found himself in now was so incredibly filthy that Eren could hardly believe it was real. It was nothing like the vast, white sheets he’d seen every winter back in Besia. Nor like the smudged outlines of North Barr road, packed white along uneven ground. Not even close to the snow piled high on the river banks he’d seen off the side of a passenger ship.

How had he ended up here? He tried to remember.

The women rose to her feet and slung a large, leather satchel over her shoulder. Her coat wasn’t fur, this stood out to Eren for some reason. Her dress was short, and her legs should have been vibrating with shivers, but they weren’t. Maybe she was used to it. She was wearing a hat, at least, her thick, black hair protruding out only slightly. The oddest thing about her appearance was the way her eyes turned up as well as the coloring of her skin. She wasn’t from this country. The country of Adva didn’t get many immigrants, most due to its isolationist policies.

Facts and figures concerning trade deals, immigration and emigration statistics, and all manner of other irrelevant things came rushing into his head. He was too cold to sort through any of it.

“Wait,” he called.

Her eyes flicked toward him.

“Where am I?”

She didn’t answer.

“Who are you?”

She didn’t answer.

He lifted himself onto his knees. Snow scattered around him in little puffs. He felt like a corpse rising out of its grave.

“Can you help me?”

She shifted, her gaze drifting away from him.

“I don’t think so.” He voice was thoughtful, but doubtful as well. As if she wasn’t quite sure of what she was saying.

And then she walked away.

 

2

Goddamn it.

Eren rifled through his own leather satchel again, as if checking through one more time was going to change anything. Nope, it was gone. and by it, he meant his coin purse, his sketch pad, and even his scarf.

He wanted to scream.

It was that bitch. She robbed him while he was sleeping. But maybe he’d gotten what he’d deserved. He had fallen asleep alone in some dark alleyway in a snow storm.

How he’d gotten in that alleyway was something he still wasn’t clear on. He remembered traveling down the North Barr road on his way to the city of Amoria He didn’t even remember entering through the city gates. He thought it might have had something to do with Hannes, and old friend of his mother’s. If that were true, maybe it was for the best that didn’t remember.

Regardless, he needed to figure out what to do now.

Part of Eren wanted to fall back into the snow and wait. Maybe this time he’d actually die of hypothermia or frostbite or whatever people died of when they were exposed to the cold too long. Then again, why wait that long? He could always light himself on fire.

None of those options seemed particularly appealing anymore. He stopped for a moment, staring out at the filthy streets and asked himself why.

Because of that girl. She’d saved his life, for better or for worse.

He breathed in deeply and took stock of the situation. What did he have? All the clothes on his back consisting of a thick wool jacket, a long-sleeved tunic and a short-sleeved one over that, a pair of trousers, a pair of boots, and a pair of linens. In addition, he had a leather satchel with nothing in it.

Why hadn’t she taken the goddamn satchel? There wasn’t anything he could do with it.

Eren checked his trouser pockets and pulled out a sheathed knife.

He could always kill someone for food.

Eren shoved the knife into his satchel, annoyed at his own morbidity and this entire situation.

 

3

Eren listed in his head all the necessities he’d need to survive in the slums of Amoria, of the poorest city in Adva. Food, water, shelter, art supplies. It was obvious which one took precedent.

He supposed some things would never change

The only questions now were whether he could find an art vendor and whether he could justify stealing their goods.

The first was difficult, the second frightfully easy.

 

4

The streets were littered with vagrants, lounging about in their own filth. Eren could barely move four paces without stepping in someone’s dog shit, horse shit, or the contents of someone’s chamber pot. At least the girl hadn’t stolen his boots off his feet.

And he’d thought that had been disgusting

He stumbled upon a week old, rotting horse carcass. Worse, when he got closer he realized there were children, none older than five years old, playing about inside it.

Where were their parents? None of the adults around seemed to be paying any particular attention.

Did they have parents?

Middle-aged men and women were huddled around him, curled up against buildings in stained blankets, shivering on doorsteps, and on their knees begging. Eren couldn’t see a single person walking along the mucky roads that looked as if they would be willing to part with even a penny.

Pointless. These men and women laid about him. They didn’t look like they saw any point in trying.

Were there people at work in this city? Maybe so, he saw some men and women walking with heavy steps. Their faces set in hard lines.

What was this place? It didn’t fit in with the world he’d known

 

5

If Eren turned down certain streets and up others, he could get to better parts of town. The roads here were wider, the sidewalks less populated. Even the snow was a tint lighter.

He didn’t expect to come across horse carcass here. No, when he looked down it wasn’t a horse carcass he saw.

Eren’s feet wouldn’t move. He stared at the man bellow him. His guts were spilled out all over the pavement. Eren’s shoe was swished into something he didn’t ever want to think about. A knife had sliced him open from one side of his belly to the other. But other than that, he looked as much a part of the scenery as most of the men and women he’d passed.

The thought stuck Eren like a backhanded slap.

He looked back and wondered how many of the other men and women he’d see were also dead.

The night before was supposed to have been one of the largest storms in years. Three to four inches of the white death, and temperatures well below the point at which water froze. The buildings on either side of Eren must have taken the brunt of snow and blocked the wind. That was probably why he’d survived.

Stupid.

Oh well.

 

6

It was almost midday before he found an art vendor. The little shop was in the best part of town Eren had found yet, which wasn’t saying much at all. He was still stepping in human excrement as made his way down the sidewalk.

He stared through the plate glass window hopelessly. He wasn’t going to be able to step into this store without arousing suspicion, not in the state he was in now.

So he loitered outside, unsure of what to do.

 

7

Eventually, he realized he was going to have to find food. Eventually, he realized that he didn’t have any skills, and therefore would most likely be unable to acquire a job. Eventually, he realized he was going to have to steal.

 

8

Eren had once dated a girl who had an unusual skill set. She’d told him many times that anyone who couldn’t do anything but sit quietly and look pretty was either going to end up killed or wishing they were dead. She’d taught him how to fight, handle weapons, and kill.

This wasn’t knowledge Eren ever wanted to use, but there were other, tamer, lessons he could put to good use in his current situation.

Breaking and entering.

He was stealing now. Four days without food and he was willing to snuff out any humanity he had left.

He was starving. Starving to death.

The first time, he’d thrown up everything he’d eaten. The second was easier, he’d robbed a family in a better part of town. He hadn’t felt like he was killing anyone.

 

9

“Who’s there?” came a soft male voice.

Eren froze.

A candle was lit and the dancing light flickered across the figure of a short blonde man in his early forties.

“Who are you?” the man asked, idling against the far wall.

Eren swallowed thickly but decided to give his real first name.

“Eren?” the man stepped closer, squinting.

He nodded.

“Why are you here Eren?”

“I was going to steal from you.”

“Is that still your intention.”

“Yes,” Eren didn’t see how lying would improve the situation.

The blonde man studied him for a few moments. “How about we make a deal,” he said.

Eren blinked.

“Well me how you got here, and I’ll give you whatever food or valuables I can get my hands on.”

“What?”

The man smiled kindly.

It was more than a fair trade. If he took this deal, he’d still be stealing. Eren opened his mouth anyway because he was hungry and he’d resigned himself to becoming a bad person.

But he wasn’t going to get caught.

“I can’t tell you.”

The blonde man sighed. “I suppose not.” he turned from Eren a walked toward his pantry. He pulled out a loaf of bread and some butter and held it out to Eren.

This was wrong. Eren didn’t want to take it, but he did anyway.

“And Eren?” the blonde man raised his voice a fraction as Eren was about to leave through the front door. “Be careful.”

Eren nodded. He couldn’t afford not to be. Krista was relying on him.

 

10

“You’re new around here aren’t you?” came a voice a little ways away.

Eren was sitting in front of the art supplies store again. It had been a day and a half since he’d finished off the blonde man’s bread, and Eren didn’t want to steal again. He knew he had to and would to survive. Just not yet.

His tired eyes rose to meet those of a short, black haired man wearing a nonchalant expression.

Eren decided not to answer.

“I can tell. I can smell fresh meat from a mile away.”

Eren couldn’t help but think that it must be a rather terrible ability, considering how many people had died the night before.

“What do you want?” Eren asked roughly

The short man took a flask out from his jacket. “From you? Don’t know yet.” He tipped the flask back and took a couple long swigs.

“Then why did you come over here?”

“Because you’re a different sort of looking person. I want you in my debt.”

“That’s rather blunt.”

“Stop talking all nice like that, it’s annoying.”

Was Eren supposed to apologize?

“What do you want?” the man asked. “I can give you a good place to stay the night, won’t even ask for a good fucking in return.”

Eren ignored the last remark “Art supplies,” he said.

 “Are you joking?”

“No,”

“Where you from kid? No place that taught you how to survive, that’s for damn sure.”

“Be that as it may-“

“Stop fucking talking like that. Not going to fly here kiddo.”

Eren closed his mouth. He didn’t want to argue with this man, especially if he was going to buy him art supplies in exchange for some vague favor in the future.

 

11

In the last few hours of the day, he began to draw.

He started with a thumbnail, trying to prime his memory. Heart shaped face? Round face? He tried some and then others. Did her hair hang like this? He wished he had seen her without that hat on. The few bangs that hung in her face were the hardest part to get right.

After thirty minutes, he came close. He could see a rough version of her in that sketch.

He took out the watercolor pad and started with a few broad strokes with a graphite pencil, slowly, slowly getting more detailed. He’d forgotten to ask for an eraser, so every edge was messy. Still, the page was becoming something recognizable. It was that girl, the girl from earlier that day. Eren realized as he looked down at her that she might have been beautiful if she hadn’t looked so sad.

He drew his scarf under her chin.

His color scheme ignored all but black, white, and red. She’d become a creature of shadow under his careful hand.

The finished product would have been too rough to include in his portfolio, but he liked it better than most things he’d created. She was his now, somehow. Maybe not exactly her, but some version he’d created in his head and on paper. He’d brought her to life.

 

12

When he awoke, his stomach, lacking any sustenance, seemed to be devouring itself whole. With no malevolent benefactor waiting in the wings, Eren supposed he was going to have to fend for himself.

But how? He had no skills besides art.

 

13

The river Amora, from which the city took its name, was the only real water source for the entire city. If he’d thought the streets had been filthy, he’d been naive. Guts and feces and waste dumped from factories, it all eventually followed down into the river.  Blood and trash and every secret anyone had ever needed to hide, it was all there just under the surface. Eren was disgusted, of course, just like he was with everything about this city, but he was also transfixed by its foreignness.

Anyone who lived in the country of Adva knew the sight of one of the three Great Rivers that poured from the Acka mountain range and down to the sea. Eren grown used to the northern most river, Besa, and its swift white rapids, both beautiful and terrifyingly unsafe.

Amora’s moved sluggishly, there hardly seemed to be any flow at all.

Eren dipped his hands down into the river’s murky brown depths and brought the water up to his mouth. He gagged, but then forced it down with an exaggerated swallow. He’d do what it took to survive.

 

14

It had been two and a half days since he’d eaten.

His resolve was breaking, he would steal tonight because he no longer had another option. But when he stumbled down to the river again, he saw, far off in the distance, an old tanner or tawner struggling scrape the hair off an animal hide.

Eren wasn’t thinking straight. All he knew was that he was desperate for food and that he was willing to do anything to get at some.

He walked to the tanner or tawner’s home as quickly as he could and begged to be of some service. He only asked for a mouthful to eat in return.

He was a man of sixteen years and the tanner was above sixty. He was grateful for the help, but only if Eren didn’t drive to hard a price.

A mouthful of bread wasn’t nothing, and it was an honest mouthful as well, which meant a lot.

 

15

Soaking hides in urine and feces and then urine again. Hair damp coated in excrement scraped off. Flesh and fat and hooves. It all ended up in the river.

 

16

The tanner’s wife expected more from Eren than the tanner.

On the third day of his employment, she followed him as he wandered through the streets. She carried a pail of food with her. Eren was desperate for it.

But the wife wasn’t offering anything, she wanted to trade.

Eren realized what she expected from him as soon as she smiled.

“Fuck no,” he growled. He jumped up and pushed past her.

He was through being someone else’s plaything. He’d rather starve

 

17

“You look half dead boy.”

Eren looked up from where he’d been sitting and sketching in his pad. His whole body ached with hunger. It was the black-haired man again. He looked down at Eren from a distance. Erne wondered whether the other man was here to collect on his debt. But what could Eren possibly do in his condition?

“Do you regret asking for shit instead of food?”

Even now, the answer came immediately to his lips. “No.”

He looked down at the page in his sketchbook. The girl stared back at him.

The black haired man narrowed his already narrow eyes. “Fine, kill yourself.”

“I will not!” Eren snapped.

“What are you planning to do? Eat paper?”

Eren hugged the sketchbook closer to his chest. Levi took note.

“Let me see it.” The man demanded, stepping toward Eren.

“Why should I?”

“You’re in my debt, boy. Let me see my sketchbook that I paid for.” Eren clutched as the cover for a few seconds but then handed it over. The black haired man did have a point.

The shorter man opened the book to a random page. His face didn’t change as he inspected it. He flipped to another, and then to another, and then through dozens.

“Almost all of these are drawings are of the same woman,” the black haired man commented. “Do you know who she is?”

Eren shook his head. “I’ve only seen her once. Do you?”

The man shrugged. “I dunno.” He tucked the sketchbook under his arm. “I’m taking this for a few days.”

Eren jumped up. “ _What?_ ”

“It’s mine, I can do what I want with it. “

“It’s got my art in it!”

“Life isn’t fair kid.” The shorter man rummaged around in his trouser pocket. “I’ll see you when I come to bring it back. And here,” he said, tossing a few coins out into the snow in front of him. “Don’t die while I’m gone.”

Eren paid the man back with a baleful look

 

18

The man hadn’t taken the rest of his art supplies. Eren still had the paints, paintings, pencils, and watercolor paper stored in his leather satchel. He put them to good use when he wasn’t scourging up food.

He used those coins with great reluctance. It was either accept the black haired man’s help or steal. He wasn’t going to steal if he could help it.

 

19

True to his word, the man was back in no less than three days. A younger blonde man accompanied him. His hair was blonder, longer, and thicker than the man who’d given bread to Eren, but one reminded him of the other.

“What’s your name?’ the blonde boy asked, peering at him with wide, calculating eyes.

Eren took some time to decide whether or not to answer.

“Eren,” he said, knowing better than to tack on his last name. The trouble that could cause was unimaginable.

“I’m Armin.”

“Telling your name to strangers now?” the black haired man asked, making it clear that he did not approve.

“Yeah, Levi. I’m not a fairytale creature. He can’t use my name to control me.”

Levi snorted.

Levi had Eren’s sketchbook under his arm. Eren nodded at it. “I want it back.”

Levi shrugged, stepping over the sludgy ground, holding it out. Eren snatched it swiftly from Levi’s hand, and none too gently either. As he did, he caught the blonde boy’s eye.

He was still looking at Eren, and then he said something very odd.

“I’ll get you some food Eren. In return, let me see some of those drawings. Okay?”

“No thanks,” Eren said, pulling his sketch book closer to his chest.

Armin frowned.

“He said he doesn’t want your help Arlert. Leave it alone.”


	2. Maddness in the Streets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren learns more about the girl who saved him. Armin tries his best to connect with the strange man.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shit gets interesting around the end of the chapter.

1

Eren hadn’t expected to see Armin again, but the yellow-haired boy appeared once more a few days later.

There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, and the sun shone unforgivingly. It melted the sludge and snow into tiny rivers that diluted the filth and grime, but not by much. It was warmer that day, and Eren felt the heat pricking at the back of his neck. He was sweating in his coat but didn’t feel comfortable enough in his skin to take it off.

Armin knew where to find him. Eren’s baggage sat neatly in a box, he couldn’t carry it with him. He had to trust the world to leave it all undisturbed.

“Why are you here?”

Armin sat curled up next to his box of art. He looked like he had been sleeping, but now his eyes were open and curious.

“Hi Eren.”

Eren repeated his question. “Why are you here?”

“I wanted to speak to you.”

“I don’t want your help.

Armin tucked his knees closer to his chest, staring down at a rivulet running through the gray snow. “Why now?”

Eren didn’t answer.

“Did you look at my art?”

Armin looked up at him. “No,” he said. “I’m not going to make you show me.”

“You are trying to make me show you.”

“I’m offering you help.”

“You’re trying to offer me something I can’t refuse.”

Armin stood up. “Do you want to take a walk?”

“No,”

Armin narrowed his eyes. “Will you take a walk with me?”

Eren crossed his arms.

 

2

He let Armin help him. It didn’t feel like he had a choice

It wasn’t long until he’d become totally dependent on Armin’s whims. That really bothered him, to the point where whenever he saw the blonde man he tensed up a little bit.

Armin was manipulating him. Eren hadn’t given Armin permission to manipulate him, who did he think he was?

He had to physically restrain himself from crushing the bread in his fingers

 

3

“What do you want Eren,” Armin asked, crouching down to look Eren in the eye.

Eren chewed on the blood red apple. Of all the questions Armin had tried to get him, this was the easiest. He even answered it. “Nothing, I’ve done what I set out to do.”

“And what was that.”

Eren shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. Why do you care?”

Armin didn’t need to answer because they both knew.

“Why do you want to see my sketchbook so bad?”

“I asked my question first.”

Did this blonde boy think he was an idiot?

“What do I want? For you to stop pretending you haven’t seen it, and to leave me alone.”

That had riled him up. “Really Eren? All you’d have to do is walk a couple blocks over and it would take me weeks to find you. If you want to get away so badly, why are you being so predictable about it?”

Eren bristled.

“So what _do_ you want?”

Eren reached for his sketchbook and tossed it at Armin. “I want to live and die on my own terms,” he said, think how impossible that wish was.

 

4

Armin stared at each page of the sketchbook for long moments, then flipped to the next and so on and then next, staring and staring and staring.

After a silence, Eren broke into his thoughts. “I’m looking for her.”

Armin tensed ever so slightly.

“Do you know who she is?” Armin asked.

“Do you?”

Armin tensed just a fraction more. He did.

“What is her name?”

“I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do.”

“How do you figure?”

“Why else would you be paying me these visits?”

 

5

Eren had been spending most of his time hiding in one or another alleyway, drawing and trying not to freeze to death. But today, for better or for worse, he’d decided to sit out on the side of some nondescript dirt road.

He was trying to imagine what the girl would look like if she were standing right here with him. He sketched her standing in the road, head tilted back as if searching the sky for some sort of meaning that wasn’t really there. He liked the idea of her being hopeful.

He doubted that anyone in this place could be so foolish.

 

6

Someone had snatched Eren’s sketchbook out of his hands.

Eren jumped up, furious, but four men closed in around him, backing him father into the alleyway.

As Eren looked from one man to another. He’d be fine.

The first man flipped through the sketchbook. He was short but thick and wore a small gray cap over his brown buzz cut.

“What do you want,” Eren growled, taking a step back. The first man was too bulky to be in any real fighting shape, but the other three looked solid enough. Eren could take them. Still, he tried to remind himself that he didn’t know what these guys might have up their sleeves.

“Relax boy,” the first one said. “We just want a little looksee at what you got here.” He seemed like the one in charge of these assholes.

The third and fourth man cut their eyes toward the first, waiting for a signal. Eren wasn’t sure if the second man would wait. He was eyeing Eren up and down in a way that he didn’t like at all.

“It’s not bad.” said the first man, nodding at his friends to stand down.

The first man ripped out a couple pages and passed them to the fourth man. “The woman in these pictures looks familiar,” he said.

The fourth man nodded “I’d say so… Wait! Shit, that’s Benio!” He started chuckling lowly and his friends joined him.

“What? You know her?” Eren asked.

“Everybody knows her.” The second man said, tone disrespectful and suggestive.

Eren had to bite down on his tongue to keep from saying things he would regrets. He was intimately familiar with that tone.

“We could sell these, pass them off as by someone important.” the first man said to the fourth. “Maybe make enough money to get your sorry ass shipped out after you die. What you got? Three weeks?”

“More like two.” The fourth man said, smiling wryly, as if dying were only a matter of course. But he didn’t look anymore haggard than the rest of the man. No obvious sign of injury or illness from what Eren could see.

Then the first man started to speak, breaking into Eren’s thoughts. “We’re taking these, and those painting you got stuffed in the cardboard box. Be nice and hand it all to us. Then maybe we won’t gut you.”

Two of them flicked out knives.

He could take them. He squared up, planting his feet firmly on the ground and bringing his hands up the way Annie had taught him.

The first man raised his eyebrows. “What do you think you’re-?”

Eren didn’t give him time to finish. He brought his leg up and knocked the third man to the ground with a roundhouse kick. The guy went stumbling. Eren lunged, yanking the knife out of his hand then kicked him again hard, this time in the stomach. He wouldn’t be getting up for a while.

He stepped to the side. The last thing he wanted was for the third man to stick out his hands and trip him. He squared up and faced the other men. They all had knives now. That was fine. Eren could take them. But then one pulled out a gun. Eren hesitated, and he felt sweat starting to trickle down the back of his neck. This was fine, he could work with this. These flintlock pistols were nothing compared to the kinds of rifle he’d seen the King’s Battalions carrying on their backs. Only one shot. As the first man leveled it him, Eren could tell he knew what he was doing.

Eren lunged out of the way and toward the second man, but before a shot rang out…

“What do you think you’re doing?”

 

7

There came a cold voice. A figure walked slowly and confidently down the middle of the alleyway.

“Ain’t any of your business Arlert.” The first man growled. The second man took advantage of Eren’s momentary distraction, slamming him against the side of one of the buildings.

“Hey!”

“We don’t gotta answer to you Thieves,” the first man said.

“I can get Levi over here, you want to say that to him?”

The second man let Eren drop to the ground.

 

8

 “Don’t go after them,” Armin said. Eren spun around and glared.

“I didn’t need your help,” Eren growled. Armin didn’t answer because he didn’t have to. They both know what Eren had said wasn’t true. Still, he didn’t need this boy looking after him. Who did he think he was? Surely not his big brother or mother.

His grip tightened on the knife then he let it go. It bounced off the ice.

“Stop looking at me like that,” Eren said, resigned.

“What did they want?” Armin asked, not acknowledging Eren’s words. Eren gestured carelessly at his leather satchel. His sketchbook poked out of the side. Armin nodded and said, “it’s almost impossible to own things like that here.”

“Yeah. I learned that after the girl stole my things,” Eren said. He didn’t need to clarify who ‘that girl’ was. Eren kicked at the sludge, but he only succeeded in getting his feet wet. “Apparently she’s well known. Heard her name was Benio”

“Oh.” Armin’s face didn’t change.

“It shouldn’t be hard to find her.”

“Dunno,”

“Yes, you do.”

Armin didn’t answer.

“Levi showed you my sketchbook. You recognized her and that’s why you’ve been hanging around. You’re trying to learn something or get something out of me. I don’t know what, I don’t care. But I want to see her. Take me to her. If you don’t, I can just ask around and find her myself. It would just be easier if you helped me.”

“Why do you even want to?” Armin’s mouth had drawn into a hard line.

“She stole some of my things. I want them back.”

“You’re lying obviously. If you really cared about coats and scarves and blankets you would have asked Levi for shelter instead of art supplies. Hell, you could have asked me for those things. You didn’t”

The mention of the scarf caught Eren’s attention. The average person in this city, from what Eren had gathered, didn’t carry around scarves. Armin must have seen his things somewhere. He must know this girl well.

“You’re friends with her then…”

“I might be.”

“…or are you sleeping with her?”

Armin drew back, wrinkling his nose.

“Look,” Eren tried to figure out how to tell Armin the truth because he didn’t think he could come up with a believable enough lie. But he wasn’t clear on his own motivations.

“She saved my life,” he hazarded.

“And now you’re obsessed with her.”

It took him a few moments to grasp exactly what Armin was implying.

He shot up from a coaching position, gathering a handful of dirty snow. He flinging it in Armin’s direction like a frustrated child. “Fuck you,” Eren snapped, turning away. How dare this boy accuse him of something like that? Especially that.

“That’s what it looks like Eren!”

“You don’t have the right to use my name,” Eren growled.

“Don’t be pompous.” Armin caught his arm, but Eren yanked out of his grip with ease.

Eren stopped walking after a few paces, realizing that Armin was his best chance at finding the girl. He couldn’t let his anger get the best of him here, so he took a few deep breaths and turned back.

“I’m a homosexual, so no, I’m not stalking her.”

“Okay,” he said, not seeming at all convinced

“Alright, fine!” Eren snapped. “If that’s how it is, why have you been hanging around me so often?”

Armin didn’t respond in kind. His words were conciliatory, but his eyes had hardened. “I’m here because Levi wanted me to look out for you. He’s interested to know what your deal is.”

“Why I should care what Levi thinks of me?”

“He’s a pretty important guy around here. People ‘round here think he’s a thug, but he’s more of a thief. The guys that run with him aren’t messed with. That why those four brutes scrammed when I told them to.”

“A lord of the underground then.”

That got to him. “Don’t you compare him to any noble.”

Now that was peculiar. Eren had never heard of a commoner that wasn’t intensely loyal to the king. They couldn’t help but be. Though, he’d never really spoken to many commoners before the past few months before. At least, not that he could remember.

He pushed that out of his mind. It didn’t matter much anyway.

“Why should I?”

“Because Levi wants to know what my deal is, right? I’ll tell you if you take me to see her.” Sure he would.

Armin stared at him for a long moment before heaving a sigh. Apparently, his loyalty to Levi was greater than his fears “Are you really a homosexual?”

“I told you I was, didn’t I?”

“Alright,” he said finally “let’s go.”

 

9

If Eren had expected they’d be headed toward a worse section of the city, he’d have been surprised to see that it was the exact opposite. The snow along the side streets was almost grey instead of brown. Passerby’s gazes were still hard, but they looked up as they walked. Their clothes were still ragged but mended instead of ripped and torn. The buildings were in better repair, and the stink wasn’t quite so nauseating. They passed by roads and cut through alleyways. Armin navigated through the labyrinth with ease.

The sun was still up. Eren thought they might have another couple of hours before it disappeared behind the walls. He wished night would come sooner. He’d grown to like the darkness better because it hid him from wandering eyes and pointed questions.

“We’re here,” Armin said, stopping in front of a fine enough looking establishment. “Would you like to wait outside while I check and see if she can come out early?”

Eren glanced inside, watching smooth movements behind red curtains. “I think I would rather stay out here, thank you.” Eren would take his chances in the cold.

But Eren realized he’d forgotten to ask him something. “Wait,” Eren held up a hand. Armin turned.

“What?”

“What’s her name?”

Armin smiled. “Mikasa.”

 

10

A man stumbled by, delirious and moaning. He ran into Eren’s side but, as Eren tried to push him away, he turned and snarled “don’t touch me, boy! I can’t stop myself.”

Eren watched him stumble on passed.

 

11

Armin came back out the door after ten or so minutes. “She’s still got several clients waiting tonight. She’ll probably be off later rather than sooner, but that’s how it is sometimes.”

“Does it bother you?” Eren asked.

“What?”

“That she’s a whore.”

Armin bristled. “Don’t talk all pompous like that. Why should it? She makes a decent living. She’s worked her way up, and now she has a decent amount of control over her schedule and clients. She’s safe, and she’s making her own decisions. But most of all, it’s her own life. It’s not my business to tell her what to or not to do with it.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know,” Eren mumbled, embarrassed.

“You’re not from around here are you?”

Eren shrugged.

 

12

“So where are you from?” Armin asked, taking a sip at his whiskey. He’d taken them down to a hole-in-the-wall tavern and offered to buy him a drink or two, at least until Mikasa finished working. Eren had accepted even though he’d known what Armin would expect in return.

“This all for Levi?” he asked.

“Sure,” Armin said, but Eren didn’t think he was being entirely truthful. Eren could tell by Armin’s dancing yet focused eyes that this blonde boy sitting next to him was inquisitive by nature. Eren supposed that, to this man, he was rather interesting. As Eren tipped back his drink he decided that he might as well reveal something, or make up something that seemed plausible enough to satisfy his curiosity. Eren would just make sure he never saw Armin again after tonight.

“Not from around here,” Eren answered vaguely.

Armin actually laughed at that. His blue eyes lit up. Eren saw them sparkle because neither of them looked away. “No really Eren, give me something.” He was almost eager, shifting around in his chair. “I can tell your accent’s northern.” He whispered it like it was some great revelation. Armin was having fun with this.

“I suppose,” he said, feeling himself warming to the conversation. Maybe it was the drink, but Eren hadn’t thought he’d had very much yet. “I lived along the Besa River if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Thanks, Eren, so does everyone with a northern accent. It is the northern river.

“Ah, right.”

How far up?” Armin asked. Eren knew what Armin was expecting to hear. There was a saying that everything flowed down the Rivers eventually, and it was true to some extent. The saying referred to the Three Great Rivers. Besa in the North, Roa in the South, and Amora down the center of the country. They all originated from the snowmelt from the Acka Mountain Range in the west and emptied into the sea to the east. With the expectation of the thriving trading cities at the mouth of each river, the farther west one traveled, the farther down the rivers, the poorer the cities and towns became. This city of Amoria was rather far west, which explained its destitution.

“Fairly far up,” Eren told him, confirming Armin’s suspicions. All his ‘pompous’ talk meant Eren must come from farther east. And it was true, but not completely true. Eren had lived lots of places.

Armin sat forward, leaning his elbows on the table and resting his chin on his interlocked fingers. “But where exactly?”

“I was a student at Sheena Monastery,” he said, naming an academic college. It existed adjoined to the most prestigious of the three temples that sat on the base of the Acka Mountain Range. The appeal of the monastery schools wasn’t necessarily their stellar academics. The palace of Besia was the home of the greatest scholars in the city. What the monasteries offered was sanctuary. No criminal, no matter how heinous, would be turned away as long as they had something of academic merit to offer the community. Even better, no government official could request the extraction of an individual for any reason.

It was a self-imposed exile. A prison of sorts. One which allowed its inmates to continue to contribute to society. All scientific advances and creative works were sold to the government in order to keep the monasteries to run. Such was the mercy of the King, at least for the useful. The useless could simply be executed.

Armin’s eyes had widened and widened, interest only growing with his answer. “So what did you do?”

Eren laughed. Armin sat back on the stool, realizing how foolish he’d probably looked.

“You’ll have to buy me a lot more whiskey if you want to hear that story.”

But Eren didn’t touch any more. It was a secret he’d never tell.

 

13

Armin was without a doubt drunker than Eren, but neither of them were too intoxicated to walk on their own. Still, the other man was putting himself in a compromising position, and Eren told Armin so.

“I have come to the conclusion that if you hurt me, Levi would tear your insides out.”

Eren didn’t particularly like the sound of that.

“I’ve actually known that for a while now. Still, you have this evil kind of look about you.”

“Evil? Really?”

“Really.”

“Alright.”

“I bet you killed someone or something.”

“Actually, I killed three men and a woman.”

“Really?”

“With only a teaspoon.”

Armin ignored him, instead, he looked off into the distance. The sun had already disappeared bellow the walls, yellow and orange light giving way to red, purple, and blue shades.

“She should be already out by now. I told her we’d walk her home, so she should be waiting.”

 

14

She wasn’t at all like Eren remembered her.

From them bundled puff ball of faded white came a sensual women in gaping, clinging, black dress. But below that painted red lipstick, powdered white face, and charcoal eyelids, there wasn’t a thing. How could someone who had forced him back to life look so dead?

“It’s cold,” was the first thing she said. She shivered in her little dress. That, at least, was the same. Armin offered her his coat. She threw it on over her own. They smiled at each other tenderly.

Were they sleeping together? This spent a moment too long considering it.

“Who’s this?” Mikasa asked, leaning toward Armin.

“Eren,” Armin told her quietly. “He’s the one I told you about.”

She shot him a suspicious look. Eren flashed back to a few hours before, when Armin had accused him of being some disgusting pervert. He clenched his fists.

He nodded at Armin. “Thank you for taking me to meet Mikasa.” He let the name roll on his tongue for a moment. Then he turned to the girl. “Thank you for saving my life.”

And that was it.

“I’ll be out of your hair now.”

He supposed he was going to have to back to stealing, but how long would that last? He knew he didn’t have any real talent. He’d be caught eventually. When that happened, his family would find him. He couldn’t allow that to happen. Would he have to kill himself when he found himself in that situation? What if he didn’t have the opportunity? Maybe the best thing to do was to keep moving. Maybe he’d have better luck finding work in a smaller town. Though, if he were being honest with himself, he hadn’t been trying too hard here. Before he resorted to anything illegal, he should probably attempt to find some honest work here in this city-

There was someone walking toward him.

 

15

Hate was not an emotion that had been acceptable, or even possible, back where Eren had come from. He hadn’t hated, never. Not even when he knew the things being done to him were wrong. Not even when he’d fought back. Not before this one moment.

And in the next, he learned that he could kill.

But that was a long time ago.

 

16

A second later, he recognized a man walking toward him. It was the crazy one from earlier that day. The one who claimed he couldn’t control himself. But he looked completely in control of himself now.

Eren stepped back, letting the man pass by. He didn’t even look in Eren’s direction. His eyes were trained on something in front of him.

Mikasa.

“Hey, the fuck are you-“ Eren tried to lay a hand on the man’s arm, but he whipped around and snarled wildly.

“Shit!” he heard Armin yell.

Now, Eren wasn’t exactly unsteady from the whiskey he’d consumed, but he wasn’t as clear-headed as he should have been either. But the reckless abandon in this man’s eyes shot adrenaline right through his system. Those eyes were familiar. That sobered him up, alright.

The man was going for his arm, looking prepared to bite it off.

Eren’s training took over. He kicked the man’s kneecap in and flipped down on his back in one effortless movement. Annie would have been proud.

“Stay down.” Eren hissed, foot hovering over the man’s windpipe.

He bit into Eren’s boot.

Eren tried to yank away, more confused than anything else, but the man’s bite force was stronger than any human’s had the right to be. The man reached up and dug his nails into Eren’s leg, ripping through his trousers and drawing blood. The action was enough to unbalance Eren and he crashed back to the dirt.

The man took advantage of Eren’s compromised position, climbing on top of him and shoving his shoulders into the ground. Eren tried to squirm out of his grip, but his strength was everything a human’s could be and too much for Eren. Eren thought that his bones might fracture to pieces under the force. He looked up into the man’s face. The naked hunger and glee he saw there froze Eren’s to the core.

The man licked his chops and descended, biting into the muscle between his neck and shoulder.

Eren screamed.

The pain was gone in a second. Someone had yanked the man backward and onto the ground next to him. Eren scrambled up, whipping his head over to what looked like Mikasa smashing a rock into the man’s head.

Blood soaked into the gray snow, turning it a disturbing pink color.

Mikasa was breathing hard. She raised her head up from the man bellow her, meeting Eren’s eyes.

“You don’t get those up in the north now do you?” came Armin’s voice from behind him.

Eren didn’t answer, his was head spinning too fast.

“Are you alright?” Mikasa asked.

“Shit, did it bite him?”

“Yeah,” Eren’s hand rose to his shoulder. “Right here.”

And then he passed out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was listening to Xl-Tt from the soundtrack while revising that fight scene. It was awesome.


	3. Cost of a Savior

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren recovers from his injuries. Armin and Mikasa struggle to help Eren understand they debt they owe him.

1

Eren awoke in a strange place.

He was lying on someone’s extremely uncomfortable wood floor. He looked up at a ceiling that had yellowed with age.

His shoulder throbbed with pain. Reaching up to massage it, he quickly thought better of it and instead let his finger dance along the hem of his shirt, and then bellow it. He felt at a bulky rag tied around his armpit. Shit! Had someone seen?

Eren thought how ridiculous it was that embarrassment over his scars was the first thing that had entered his mind. Especially as he felt at the thing that might have been a dish cloth, it was slightly damp. Blood? He pushed harder and immediately regretted it. He brought his fingers up in front of his face.

Yes, blood.

He felt panic rising in his stomach. he was about to rip off the fucking thing when a voice echoed somewhere from across the room.

“Don’t”

 

## 2

“Thank god she got it off of you that quick,” Armin said, sighing.

It was dawn and both Mikasa and Armin were sitting at a round wooden table. It was pushed up against the wall, right under the only window in the room. Mikasa tore a piece of bread and smearedjam all of it. She pushed a wooden plate over at Armin. The blonde boy ignored it. He was too busy looking at Eren.

“Give it to Eren,” Mikasa ordered. “He hasn’t eaten in days. At this rate, he’ll starve to death.”

“I’ve been asleep for days?” Eren asked, concerned.

Armin picked up the plate and walked toward where Eren sat, folded up on the floor. “She exaggerates,” he said, handing the meager meal to Eren. “You haven’t been out for more than twelve hours.”

“He was bitten by one of those devils. He might as well have been out for that long.”

_“Bitten.”_

“Thankfully, not for long,” Armin said. “Otherwise you might have caught the Pox.”

 

 

3

He’d been bitten.

He’d been _bitten._

Eren had experienced countless injuries in his life. Broken ribs, sprained wrists, slits carved into his arms, knees dislocated, a concussion, and purple bruises and welts in every place imaginable. All those injuries either came from hand to hand combat drills or punishments.

But bitten? In a fight? Sex was one thing, this was fucking extensive. The deranged man had almost bitten right into his muscle. As it was, he’d ripped off a layer of skin. He might have a scar in the shape of teeth marks.

When Eren considered it, he couldn’t squash the feeling that was a little too close to pleasure. Of all the injuries he’d received, none have them had been impressive. They’d been pathetic. This was impressive.

He’d been bitten.

 

4

His shoulder throbbed, but not badly. He was capable of moving, though he tried to avoid using his left arm. He wasn’t a glutton for pain.

Eren peaked out over the couch. “What am I doing here?” he asked.

Armin looked up, smiling. “You’re awake,” he said.

“Obviously.”

Armin slid out of his chair and walked over to where Eren was lying. “How are you feeling?” he asked.

“Not great,” Eren told him, struggling to sit up. He had aches and pains all over his body and they weren’t even from the fight. The floor was damn uncomfortable.

“I’m sure, but you’re healing up nicely all things considered.”

“Is that so?”

“Maybe a half a minute longer and you would have been in trouble. You could have died even.”

“Are you joking? The guy bit me, he didn’t try to tear my leg off.”

Armin shook his head. “Bodily fluids can spread the disease.”

 

## 5

“How long do you want me hanging around here?” Eren asked Mikasa when she came back the next night.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “You can stay as long as you want.”

Eren frowned.

 

6

Three days later he had to ask himself, why the hell was he still here?

He’d been injured, sure, but what was that to Armin or Mikasa? Why didn’t they just drop him off at a hospital or infirmary, or leave him on the streets somewhere. Why’d they feel the need to take him to their own goddamn tenement?

At least he knew how Armin and Mikasa knew each other. They lived in the same the tenement so they were probably sleeping together.

 

7

Armin and Mikasa, Eren learned, lived in a tenement together in the ‘nicer’ part of town. There were three rooms. The main room had a wood burning stove and a few shelves piled sparsely with food. A nondescript wood table was pushed up against a wall near the only window. Sitting on either side of that table were a pair of nondescript wooden chairs. A clothesline hung from the ceiling. Hanging from it, along with the dresses and tunics and linen undergarments and shifts, Eren saw dish towels stained with his blood.

The other two room were most likely Mikasa and Armin’s bedrooms, but Eren hadn’t wanted to invade their privacy by checking.

The tenement was smothering Eren. There were too many things inside for such a small area. Eren didn’t understand how Armin and Mikasa hadn’t gone mad living here.

 

8

Mikasa was out during the day. Armin left when the sun went down. Eren wondered whether this was their original schedule, or whether they’d altered it in order to keep an eye on him. He wouldn’t have blamed them if they had. He wouldn’t have trusted himself.

Still, he found it uncomfortable to be around Armin for extended periods of time. The blonde boy was so goddamn nice. Eren didn’t trust him.

It was worse with Mikasa. She’d saved his life. That wasn’t something he was going to be able to repay.

 

9

When Mikasa came back the second day, Eren made sure to thank her for it.

“What are you talking about?” she asked.

“When you lifted the deranged man off me,” and then crushed his skull with a rock. “You saved my life.”

Mikasa regarded him without blinking. “That man was headed straight for Armin and me, not you. You could have run and gotten away.”

“You could have as well.”

“No, Eren. I was what he wanted. You were just in the way.”

“And then you saved me. It balances itself out.” Eren was so relieved. If that was how she saw it, he could just leave. There wouldn’t be anything tying him there.

But Mikasa ruined it. “We aren’t. Not at all. I never put my life in danger. I knew I could kill that thing while its attention was on you. You rushed headlong into a situation you didn’t understand at merely the suggestion it might be a threat. You didn’t even know us.”

“It’s what anyone would have done,” Eren muttered.

“No, it wasn’t. I wouldn’t have done it for you.”

Eren didn’t want these people indebted to him. He didn’t like even like them so he muttered “That’s not how I see it,” and then shrugged. Immediately he regretted the last bit as white hot pain shot down his back. He hissed with pain.

“You almost died for us.”

“I really don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

She didn’t clarify. Instead, she asked, “when was the last time Armin changed your bandage?”

“I can change my own bandages,” Eren said.

“No, you can’t. You don’t have the range of motion for it.”

“Maybe I don’t want my bandages changed,” Eren replied sullenly.

“I’ve seen your scars,” Mikasa told him. Of course, Eren knew that. She’d changed his bandages a couple times.

“Armin!” she called.

Armin poked his head out of his room. “What do you need? Whatever it is, it can’t be long. Levi wants us early tonight. We’re preparing for the Procession in a couple months. You know how it is.”

“When was the last time you changed Eren’s bandages?”

Armin shrugged. He hadn’t once. The first time he’d knelt down and tried, Eren had shied away, making it clear he didn’t want to be touched. The blonde boy hadn’t pressed the issue. He’d just apologize and receded back into his bedroom guilty. Eren didn’t have a clue why, but he didn’t look a gift horse in the mouth.  

Mikasa sighed and hunted around the tenement for a couple clean rags.

 

10

Armin slept most of the day and only came out for lunch. Eren guessed that it was because Armin stayed out all night doing whatever it was that he did with Levi.

That left Eren with absolutely nothing to do but steal random pieces of paper and draw little designs on them. He supposed he could go outside, but if he did, he wouldn’t come back. The injury was bothersome enough, but it wouldn’t impede his efforts to survive much. But that debt, it tied him to these people.

He didn’t like that at all. He needed to figure out a way to erase that.

 

11

Questions had been festering in Eren’s mind for three days. He wanted answers but was afraid that if he asked for them, Armin would want the same back. Then again, maybe the information Eren had bullshitted at the tavern a few days before would be enough.

When Armin roused himself, Eren pounced on him almost before he was out of his room.

“What was that thing that attacked me,” Eren asked. He had been sitting in Mikasa’s chair, but now he was leaning so far forward that he was practically squatting over nothing.

Armin paused and then circled around to the table next to Eren, forgetting to fish around the cupboard for something to eat. He sat down across the way from Eren and folded his hands together. “It was somebody infected with the Pox.”

“The Pox?” Eren asked.

“The Devil’s Pox. Is that something they don’t have in your monastery?”

Eren thought for a moment. ‘It sounds vaguely familiar.”

Armin his head, resentment creeping into his expression. “Of course. As if nobles and bureaucrats would have to deal with disease.” Eren shifted uncomfortably, but Armin didn’t linger on the topic. “It’s a pretty common plague in the city. Almost everybody knows somebody who’s died from it. Issue is,” Armin leaned forward, “before it kills, sometimes it drives people mad.”

Eren stared at him.

“Now, it’s a very small minority, less than a tenth of a percent. If it were higher, the city would have been overrun by monsters. Still, it’s still something the rest of us have to look out for. These men and women become hungry for anything you can think of. Food, drink, sex, power, money, material possessions. Their desires slowly grow into something all-consuming. They have no impulse control, but their conscience is still intact. Everything that makes a person a person has to watch in horror as their bodies become monsters.”

Armin leaned back. “Usually, we don’t have to worry about them much in the winter. The disease comes in a harsh wave in the spring and burns through the summer.”

“How do you know all this?” Eren asked, horrified.

Armin hesitated. “I suppose it becomes pretty easy to put together once you’ve seen enough of them. Sometimes they’re monstrous, the way you witnessed them three nights ago. Sometimes they can almost fool you into thinking they’re human.

 

12

Eren shut off after that, thinking back to the way that man had acted at first. He seemed desperate, sure, but not crazy. When he’d attack Eren, he’d seemed like a wild beast, but before that he’d just been a scared, confused human being.

Mikasa had killed that person.

Eren shook his head at himself. He wasn’t in any position to judge.

 

13

Mikasa didn’t leave for work the next day. In fact, neither Armin nor Mikasa left the tenement. They’d locked all the doors and windows and were now talking in hushed voices to each other.

“What’s going on?” Eren asked.

Armin cast a glance over toward him but it was Mikasa that answered. “Bread riots.”

“Bread riots?”

“Yes,”

“People are rioting over bread?”

“The lack of it, yes.”

“They’re quite common actually,” Armin said. “They’re usually confined to the poorer parts of the city, but it’s been bad this year. With famine, the plague takes a stronger hold. It’s as if the sickness can sense our weakness.”

“So they’re crazy?”

“No, they aren’t all infected with the Pox, if that’s what you’re asking,” Armin said grimly.

“But is rebellion any more rational?” Mikasa asked.

 _“Rebellion?”_ Eren could not have heard them right.

Armin shook his head. “This isn’t rebellion. They just want something to eat.

 

 

14

“I’m changing your bandages,” Armin announced. “Mikasa will be furious if I don’t.” Eren shrugged, trying to feign indifference.

Armin was careful not to touch him any more than was absolutely necessary, but contact was occasionally made. He was afraid Armin might feel the roughness of his scars. Looking up into Armin’s face, though, Eren thought that maybe he shouldn’t be so worried. Every faint touch drew Armin’s features closer together, even if his smile tried to convey an openness. Eren couldn’t help but find this fascinating, He decided that as long as Armin’s eyes flitted away from his every time they met, his interest was alright.

That was until he realize why Armin was acting

“You don’t have to act like this,” Eren muttered, scratching at his wrists.

“Hmm?” Armin asked, feigning some degree of ignorance. He was pulling down at the hem of Eren’s shirt, trying to wrap the cloth under Eren’s armpit.

“Like you’ve done something wrong. It’s creepy.” Eren said.

And then came the words he hadn’t wanted to hear. “Eren you saved our lives.”

“So you guys keep saying.”

“It’s true,” Armin said. Eren didn’t bother to answer. Armin was kneeling in front of him, holding Eren’s bad arm out straight as he tried to wrestle a long, clean dishrag under his shirt.

“Eren, please let me take this off,” Armin said, exasperated after the couple minutes of struggle.

“No.”

“I can’t wrap this around properly with your tunic in the way. You’ve been wearing the same shirt for three days. Do you want me to lend you one of mine?”

Eren yanked away, wincing in pain.

Armin crossed his arms, attempting to look stern.

“Fine!” Eren snapped, balling fists into his tunic. He ripped it off with his good hand and tossed it aside.

“Thank you,” Armin said, any hint of irritation gone. He scooted closer, taking Eren’s arm again. Eren didn’t move. He didn’t care anymore.

“It’s not bleeding so much now. We might not need to do this again.” He could see Armin scanning. And while Armin’s eyes were filled with a desire of sorts, the man’s reasons for searching Eren’s exposed body were purely academic. Armin knew he was hiding something. He wanted to know what.

“Oh my god!” came the breathy gasp. His hands dropped off Eren’s shoulder.

Eren held out his forearms. They were littered with thin and straight scars. Remnants of the little slits that had been called lessons.

Armin moved in too close and picked up each wrist in his hands. “What have you done to yourself?”

Eren stared down at Armin’s hands because he could look him in the face. “I didn’t make them,” he said, and that was the truth.

“Well, it looks like you did.”

“And it looked like I was stalking Mikasa didn’t it?”

Armin let go.

 

15

Armin stayed home that night. Armin would stop looking at him. Armin was being so nice and caring and it was pissing Eren off                                                                                                                                              

This yellow-haired boy didn’t understand anything. Eren wasn’t some child that needed to be minded. He could fend for himself. He had been for a while now, maybe his whole life. There wasn’t much the world could throw at him that he hadn’t already seen.

Eren didn’t have much to gather up, but he was leaving anyway. He had no use for Armin’s tunic and so he exchanged it for his own. His knee high boots were leaning against the wall by the door. He shoved those on too. It was only after he saw a toe poking out of his left boot that he realized there was a fucking hole where the man had bitten into.

Could he take one of those on his own?

An irrational fear of the outside world punched him in the gut. In his mind, every back streets and gutter hid a deranged man with a gaping jaw.

He shivered and then wanted to punch himself in the face for being such a wimp. He wasn’t going to let some monster keep him cooped up here. He had to leave. And anyway, he’d survived on the streets well enough for weeks without running into any of those things. The encounter had probably just been a fluke.

He could survive.

He was convincing himself of this as he stood up, but then he remembered he’d gotten most of his food from Armin.

He’d just have to go back to stealing. He’d figure it out.

But first, he needed to erase that debt. He didn’t want that hanging over his head forever.

 

16

Eren burst into Mikasa’s room.

Armin and Mikasa were there. They’d been speaking in low voices. He’d hadn’t exactly waited by the door, but when he heard his own name amidst their mumbled conversations, he decided he didn’t need any more of a reason to invade their privacy.

“Eren!” Armin exclaimed, startled.

Eren ignored him. “Mikasa, you said you owed me a debt. Well, it’s time to pay up.”

Mikasa was silent.

“Well?”

The two of them were sitting on a thin cot, one that was much too narrow for two people. But then they had two bedrooms, didn’t they? So Mikasa and Armin weren’t sleeping together.

Mikasa spoke, breaking into Eren’s useless tangent of thoughts. “What are you getting at?” her voice was steady and her eyes were purposely dulled. They sucked in his rage instead of reflecting it back.

“How much is this debt worth?”

“In what, currency?” Armin asked, incredulous.

“What else?” Eren snapped.

Armin closed his mouth, which had fallen open just a fraction. “Alright Eren, do you realize what you’re saying?

“Eren, you saved our lives.” Mikasa’s voice was cold.

“I didn’t really, I don’t why you keep saying that!”

“Eren, are you asking us how much our lives are worth?”

“In currency?” Armin’s voice was shaking with anger. “You’re a fucking pompous ass you know that.”

“You’ve got some nerve. We’re not your slaves.”

“What are you talking about?”

Mikasa sighed. “It's fine, whatever-“

“No, what are you even talking about.” His voice had gone up an octave.

“What do you even want with…Eren?!”

“I don’t know what you’re saying. You’re being absolutely ridiculous. It’s a debt, it’s not.” Eren broke off. “It’s not like that. It’s not something you owe-“ Eren shut his mouth.

Armin and Mikasa were both staring at him.

Eren searched their faces, looking for something. “You don’t understand. It’s not-“ he needed to fucking stop.

“Eren where are you going?”

They heard the door slam.

 

17

Eren sat crumpled against that art vendor’s building for what felt like a year and a day.

He stared up at a sky for hours, looking for a single star, but the even the frigid winter air wasn’t enough to cut through all the smog. He strained anyway because he remembered that Krista liked it when he drew pictures in the sky.

But the night sky dissipated and the blazing sun crept back up above the walls. He watched its ascent, hoping its rays would burn holes in his eyes. His stomach was growling. He hadn’t eaten since the morning before.

Why did he always end up like this? Wouldn’t it just be easier to get lost?

He was an idiot.

It hadn’t snowed the night before unfortunately. If he’d been covered in a blanket of white, he would have finally repaid his debt.

 

18

“What are you doing here?” came a voice from above him.

“How did you find me?” Eren asked, looking up at the short black haired man.

“I wasn’t looking.”

“Do you usually hang around art vendors then?”

Levi shrugged.

 

19

Eren should have moved on, disappeared somewhere Mikasa and Armin or Levi would never have found him. But there he was, an hour after Levi had appeared. He’d never been very good at hiding.

 “Eren?” Armin’s timid voice came echoing.

“Yeah?”

“Are you okay?”

Eren smiled a little bit. “Sure,” he said. If okay was a warm sense of terror, then yes, Eren was okay. He didn’t know, not at all.

Something hard hit him in the shoulder.

“There’s your answer,” Mikasa told him. Eren looked down at where a drawstring bag had fallen. He looked up and gave Mikasa for a moment before picking it up. When he opened it, he saw that the bag was filled with coins.

“That’s my life’s savings,” she said.

It didn’t look like much.

He spilled the coins into his hand in almost a panic. He ran his fingers across each monarch’s face, counting them all up.

“This is it?” Eren asked quietly. Eren had owned shirts that were worth more than what he held in his hand. Hell, his stepmother had ordered cakes that were more expensive. He’d bought cufflinks for double. Cufflinks worth two people.

“People aren’t worth very much down here Eren.”

This was sick. This wasn’t what the world was like. He was sure that he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. This couldn’t be real.

Eren dumped the coins back into the pouch, unable to look at them for a second longer.

“I don’t want it,” he muttered as he stood up, offering the bag back.

“It’s yours,” Mikasa said. “Consider all our debts paid.”

“I don’t WANT this!” Eren’s voice was shaking.

“It’s what you asked for,” Armin said, pulling something out of his pocket as well.

“Don’t!” Eren yanked his hand outward, gesturing wildly at the vendor behind him. “I just wanted some art supplies!” he cried out.

Armin had another drawstring bag, but, and thank god, he tucked in back in his trouser pocket. Then he looked up, eyes softening. “Then why didn’t you just say so?”

 

20

He unwound his own bandages that night, but he didn’t rewrap his wound. He’d let it breathe, for better or for worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now that I’m done completely destroying Eren’s conceptions of this world, we can get into the good stuff.


	4. The Art of Kindness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren adjusts to his new life. Armin attempts to befriend him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like my writing style might be a little off. I was reading The Catcher in the Rye before I worked on the third draft. It's got a pretty distinctive narration.

1

This first time he stood in front of that canvas, he almost started to cry. It took him back to the life he’d had before.

The moment he’d found art, he’d found freedom. Still, most things don’t turn out as perfect as that. His freedom ended with a half-finished acrylic painting. It was an assignment and a shitty one at that. The crown commissioned a painting full of bright colors to happiness. It was supposed to depict the impending marriage of the bastard daughter of the king, and the son of the primary member of the bureaucratic leadership. The nuns thought they’d found the perfect person for the job. They were wrong. It didn’t work for him. The fact was the Eren couldn’t do it. For the most part, it was because he simply wasn’t interested in happy scenes. Not ones with bright colors and light brushstrokes. Yellows and oranges were glaring spotlights. Light showed every ugly chick. Flaws were fine, of course. But a real person were just a shriveled corpses. Loving a dead thing is impossible. It’s repulsive. Eren sometimes wondered if he was the only one who understood this. People all around him fell in love because they were blind. It was easy to ignore the truth most of the time, he supposed. But then, by chance, the lighting fixes itself just right and everything. And then that was it, wasn’t it? It’s over. But then people fell in love over and over and over again, as if they expected it was going to be better this time around. That was idiotic.

And so he left.

And now here he was staring at a blank canvas thinking about this girl and everything else. Because, unfortunately, it was possible to fall in love with a shrivel corpse, even if you did see how broken and dead it was. People were idiots, Eren was no exception.

He didn’t even leave it half-finished this time. He just left it alone.

 

2

Starting a sketchbook was an intimidating thing. Usually, he had two or three running at once. That way he was always in-between start and finish. Beginnings and endings were monumental milestones, they necessitated a period of catching your breath and looking around. A person lost momentum if they did too much of that.

Eren couldn’t lose momentum

 

3

“Can I see it?” Armin asked, minutes after Eren had put the pencil down. Eren only gripped the sketchbook harder.

“You don’t have to show me if you don’t-“

“Fuck off.”

Armin’s eyes were on him. Not the blue ones, black ones that stared up at him from the page.

Armin reached out and pinched the book lightly, not saying a thing.

Eren let go. Armin took it.

Minutes passed.

Armin looked up, face blank and eyes cast somewhere above Eren’s head. “Is this really how you see me?” he asked. He was trying to look unaffected, but it was obvious that he cared. Here he was letting Eren of all people hurt him.

“Yes,” he said without having any real idea if it was true.

“Thanks,” Armin set the book down neither gently nor carelessly. It just sat there, the monster looking up at the drywall ceiling.

Eren could have explained to him that he wasn’t special at all. He drew everyone that way. Everyone except Mikasa and Krista. He didn’t think Armin would understand.

He took the sketchbook back off the table.

 

4

“What are you drawing?”

“Sketching.” Eren corrected.

“You don’t have to be pompous about it.”

“Do you enjoy calling me that?”

“Maybe,” Armin slid down the wall until his butt hit the ground. He sat a respectful distance away from Eren. But Armin didn’t know better. Eren was so preoccupied, he probably wouldn’t have noticed if Armin plopped down on his lap, as long as it didn’t disturb his work.

He did his head to the right, peeking at the page Eren was fooling around with. “The clothesline?” He sounded unimpressed.

“I like the composition.” Eren’s tone wasn’t defensive. He’d heard a lot worse from those who knew a lot more. Criticism was something you had to learn to take.

“The what??”

“How everything looks. See,” Eren pointed to the clothesline above their heads, “most of what’s going on is in the background, with the tables and chairs and everything piled bellow it. The white tunic hangs slanted at the top and then folds in and out on the right side. That, along with the window on the left side, frames the table and chairs. I can increase the shading around the tables and chairs to add contrast too. That’s the great thing about art. You can change reality if reality doesn’t fit perfectly together. But that’s kind of the terrible things about it too. We have to accept life as it is, but even the greatest artist come under criticism and is expected to improve.” Erne blinked, he hadn’t meant to get all philosophical there. Anyway, it’s not going to be anything mind blowing because I’m only sketching it out.”

“There are people in this world that don’t accept life as it is.” There was a smile in his voice. A kind one. Yeah, kind, that was likely.

Eren’s molars had sharp edges. Chewing on his tongue worked well when his mouth was dry and when he couldn’t scratch at his wrists.He was chewing now, he knew it looked odd and sounded disgusting, but he didn’t particularly care.

He turned toward the blonde boy. Yellow hair. He couldn’t stand blonde hair.

Armin must be rather proud of himself at that moment, and it pissed him the fuck off.

The smile was falling from the blonde boy’s face. Good.

 

5

The day after he took his 8B pencil and sat opposite of Armin, intent on retribution.

“Hey Eren, do you want me to get you something to eat?”

Eren knew where the pantry was. He could get his own damn self something to eat if he wanted to. Instead, Eren flipped open his sketchbook.

He stared at Armin for a long tense moment, the boy shifted anxiously under Eren’s gaze.

Eren fucking attacked the paper.

The shapes were sharp and geometric. The lines, long and dark. Graphite started overlapping and intersecting almost immediately. Still, something was forming under his hand. It wasn’t Armin. He knew it wasn’t Armin, but he kept glancing up at the blonde man for reference. No matter what he did, it wasn’t Armin.

It still felt good.

 

6

Armin didn’t speak to him the rest of that day or at all the next. If Mikasa noticed, she didn’t say anything.

Eren couldn’t even say that he was grateful. The pressing weight was still there. He hadn’t expected it to change.

 

7

Eren was sitting across from Armin again, just as they every midday for the last week. It was almost a routine now. Armin hated it, and, if Eren was being honest with himself, he didn’t particularly care for it either.

“Please stop.” Armin voice was stronger than Eren had expected it to be.

Eren didn’t acknowledge the other boy’s statement, just kept scraping away with the 2B pencil.

“Eren,” his voice hadn’t gotten harder, no, it had become gentler. Eren felt Armin’s finger poke one of his knuckles. “You don’t like me,” Armin said.

“No, I don’t.”

“Why?”

“You’re an idiot.”

“That’s not very nice.”

“It’s true.”

“Why do you say that?” God, was he talking to a therapist?

“You don’t know who or what I am.”

“You saved our lives Eren.”

“What if King Reiss had stepped into the street that night and saved both of you? Would you forgive him for all he’s done?”

“Are you trying to tell me you’re King Reiss? Because if so you look a lot younger than I expected. Handsomer too.”

Despite himself, Eren smiled down at the paper.

“Why are you drawing me Eren?”

“It’s a sketch,” Eren told him. “Nothing final or cleaned up or nice looking. Just a sketch.” Flattery did get you anywhere. Now he was apologizing.

“Okay, then why are you sketching me.”

“Because it pisses you off!” Eren snapped. “And also because you’re interesting to look at!”

Eren realized in a moment what that must have sounded like, especially after Armin’s remarks. It occurred to him that it probably was exactly what it looked like. That made him want to bash his head against a wall. He tried to save face, like a moron “There isn’t much else in here.”

“Oh? What makes me so interesting then?” Armin very interested in this second little tidbit of information. Eren was done with this conversation.

 

8

In his life, Eren constantly found himself in situations he couldn’t control. Most of the people who’d influenced him were ones he’d never wanted in his life at all. He dealt with it all by making art. He channeled all that rage and hurt and confusion into something physical. The subjects in his art were what scared him, the things he didn’t understand or couldn’t influence, or the things that broke his heart.

His mother, his brother, his father, his stepmother, Krista, Mikasa, and now… Armin. If he couldn’t draw or paint them, he didn’t know what he’d become.

 

9

“You asked me what I want,” Eren said a few moments after they’d lapsed into silence.

“What?” Armin asked. “When?”

Eren’s mouth turned up at the corner. He didn’t even remember. Still, Eren decided to give him an answer

Art.

That was it. That’s the one thing he allowed himself to want. To make art.

It the only thing he’d ever wanted.

“Eren?”

“Nothing,” Eren said, rising from the table. “I don’t want anything.”

Eren didn’t have to look at his face to know Armin didn’t believe him.

 

10

“Eren tried to tell me he was King Rod today,” Armin called out to Mikasa, loud enough for Eren to hear.

Armin was changing in his bedroom. Mikasa was tearing off a piece of bread. She had a delayed reaction. For a moment Eren didn’t think Mikasa was going to even acknowledge what was said. But then her head shot up and her eyes widened.

She hesitated for a long moment. Neither Eren nor Armin had noticed, they were too focused on each other.

“Maybe he is.”

 

11

Eren stood in front of the canvas again. He’d been sketching and sketching for days and days, and now he felt like it was finally time to create something.

He wanted to

The most obvious place to start was what made him happy. That was what his last commission he been. But again, he didn’t make art with bright colors. So where did that leave him?

Depicting his mother had to be the only other possible choice. He tried to think of her at her happiest moment. He imagined her in the city, the farm, the mansion.

He stopped thinking.

 

12

Armin stood in the doorway to his room, watching Eren carefully.

“What?” Eren snapped.

“You’re in a foul mood.”

“Am I?”

“You’ve been staring at that bowl,” Armin pointed to the one sitting on the counter, “for at least fifteen minutes as if it were the source of all your problems.”

“Have you been watching me for fifteen minutes?”

“In my defense, I hadn’t meant to. I spent a couple minutes trying to figure out what the bowl could have possibly done to you, and then I wanted to see how long you could keep up that unblinking stare. Now I’m concerned. Have you any childhood trauma associated with being beaten with a bowl?”

“I’ve been beaten with many things, I don’t believe a bowl was one of them.”

Armin went mute. Eren chewed at the inside of his cheek. He shouldn’t have said that.

“…that was a joke.”

“Was it?”

“I mean,”

“It’s not exactly out of the ordinary to have abusive parents. Not around here.”

“Good to know.”

“Eren-“

“No, really. That great to know. I’ll be sure to tell all my friends so that they’ll feel better. It’s nice to know you’re not alone.”

 

13

Usually, that was enough to scare people away, but maybe Armin was right. What did it actually matter? If a person wasn’t so caught up in appearances, maybe they could move on. Eren wouldn’t know.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“You’re going to try and psychoanalyze me, aren’t you?”

“What?”

“You’re going to be my phycologist.”

“Which are?”

“There doctors that help treating people with their mental health.”

“As in they fix crazy people.”

“People with mental disorders.” Eren corrected.

“Did a phycologist tell you that you’ve got a ‘mental disorder?’?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been to one.”

“Then it’s my job to find a ‘mental disorder’ to explain your misplaced hatred for that bowl.”

Eren didn’t give him the satisfaction of any show of mirth.

“And anyway, you’re avoiding the question.”

“No, I’m just not going to answer it.”

“Why not?”

Well, there was always the fear of being caught. The more he said, the more clues he left behind. But more than that, he also didn’t like the eagerness with which Armin was trying to get close to him. Armin made an effort to speak with Eren almost every day. Sometimes when he came back from wherever the hell he went in the mornings, sometimes when he came out of his room for lunch, or maybe when he left at night. I didn’t matter how often Eren rebuffed him because occasionally he’d forget to. Then Armin had more fuel to go on for days more.

“It’s been three weeks since you came to stay with us Eren. Aren’t we friends yet?”

Eren’s head whipped around. “Are you joking?”

Armin had his knees drawn up to his chin. He was looking at Eren out of the corner of his eye. He wasn’t joking.

 

14

“Eren I know you’re only doing this to piss me off.”

He was back to using his 8B pencil. Savage strokes covered the crisp clean page before him.

“No Armin, I want to draw.”

“Two birds with one stone.” He actually sounded angry for a change.

“You know what, Armin, you’re right.

“And now you’re trying to escalate this.”

“Shut up.”

“You know what? I will. But you’ll have to tell me why you hate me first.”

“I don’t hate you.”

“Yes you do, and you have from the moment you met me.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“I first thing you said to me was fuck off.”

“No, it wasn’t.”

“Stop contradicting everything I say! Tell me and I’ll shut up.”

Eren tried to come up with something on the fly. Armin knew he was from a wealthier part of the country, so he said “it’s because you’re beneath me.”

“That’s not true. If that were true, Mikasa wouldn’t have found you collapsed in an alleyway.”

“What do you want me to say?”

“What did I do to you?”

Eren jerked back in the kitchen chair. The truth was that Armin hadn’t done anything, not yet. Eren was still waiting.

“So?”

“Yeah, like I’m going to fall for that shit.”

“Fall for what? You think I’m trying to trap into something?”

“Stop twisting my words.”

“I wasn’t!” Armin had his elbows on the table. He raised his hands, palms up, to the ceiling.  “Can’t we just be friends? We live together now. Wouldn’t it just be easier if we could get along?”

Eren didn’t answer. He went back to sketching.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> kudos and comments are always appreciated! Contact me at fitzfire on tumblr :)


	5. Once Upon a Memory

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren struggled with the holes in his memories. Armin reacts to the information Eren mistaken reveals.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Season 2 everyone! The episode was so great! Poor Mike. Plus dorky eremika siblings are dorky. Chapter 50 is going to end my life. Super disappointed it's one arc, because this fic is going to remain Anime Spoilers for a while. Characters like Kenny and Uri aren't going to be introduced for a while.
> 
> This chapter and the next one really annoy me. I had to split them up because I'm trying to keep the chapters between 2000-5000 words. I think short chapters work better with these frequent breaks. Still, this is all just set up! I want to get into the 'Festival Arc'. Oh well, hope you enjoy anyway.

1

A friendship of convenience.

Eren remembered this sprawling farmhouse on the river Roa. He’d been one of two children living there. Proximity had made him Krista’s fast friends.

But what had that become?

 

2

Eren knocked on Armin’s door.

“Mikasa?” came the blonde man’s voice. It was four in the afternoon. Mikasa wouldn’t be back for at least three hours.

“No, it’s me,” Eren said.

There was a pause, but then Eren could here Armin shuffling toward the door.

“What do you need?” his voice sounded exhausted. Eren had probably woken him up.

They stared at each other. It only occurred to him now that friendship may have been different for a boy of seven then it was for a man of twenty-three.

Still.

“You're right,” Eren told him. Armin’s eyelids were still heavy with sleep. His blue eyes were still dull, but they sharpened with every passing moment. Eren hurried on because he didn’t want to be pinned in place. “It would be easier if we got along.”

 

3

Getting along wasn’t terrible, Eren had to admit that. Armin wasn’t bad company. When he opened his mouth, something interesting and useful usually came out. He was smart, much smarter than Eren; but he was also weak, both physically and emotionally. He was too trusting. He expected good things out of people. Or maybe he just expected good things from Eren. Eren exploited that.

“Stop moving,” Eren ordered, glaring at the blue eyed boy.

Armin rolled his eyes. “How long am I going to have to lay here?

Eren looked down at his sketch pad. The proportions were right and most of the details were filled in. However, he wasn’t very far into shading. “A little while longer.”

“Eren I do need to go to sleep eventually. I have a late night ahead of me.”

“Yeah.” The fabric folds in Armin’s tunic bunched together around his stomach like a hanging stage curtain tied at the middle. Those little crinkles expanded down the curve of Armin’s figure, down into the rumpled sheets. The folds were like waves. Armin was drowning in them.

“Eren? Are you listening to me?”

 

4

Right now, Armin’s eyes were a bit duller, just a little bit more tired than they were when he woke up at dusk. Eren preferred those unfocused eyes because he had a suspicion that if Armin stared too long, he’d see right through him.

Eren found that he’d started to trust Armin’s eyes. Eren relied on them to clue him into when he did and did not have to be careful.

He wondered if Armin was using that to his advantage.

 

5

“Where do you go?” Eren asked one night. Armin didn’t answer as he shrugged on a leather satchel. Eren realized it was his leather satchel. He hadn’t seen his scarf in a while either. Were Mikasa and Armin seizing his material possessions? He wasn’t as upset about it as he should have been.

“I work with Levi,” Armin told him. “You already knew that.”

“What do you do?”

Armin let the satchel slide down his arm. “Ah, it’s hard to explain.” He thought for a moment. “I suppose we’re thieves.”

Eren didn’t pry. It would have been hypocritical

 

6

He hadn’t painted in a while.

His paints and brushes rested in a basket, sitting on one of the cupboards untouched. Eren took note of them but stood up to grab a cup of water. He dunked it in the bucket Mikasa had drawn from the well, coming up with a mug half empty. Funny, the water didn’t look so gross now. He supposed it was easier to ignore something when the proof wasn’t right in front of you.

He placed the cup on the wooden table and laid out his paints next to it. He picked up the first and only canvas Mikasa and Armin had bought him, and laid it out on the table.

He needed to paint _something_.

Eren flipped through his sketchbook carelessly, pretending to himself that he didn’t know exactly which page he was looking for. Past the pages clustered with small sketches of Mikasa and now past still-life after still-life. He lingered a moment on the study of the clothesline and the window. How long had it been since then? It must have been weeks. Time passed oddly all cooped up in this tenament, but he didn’t have much reason to leave. It had hidden him well enough, for now. And now that he was settling down, he had the strangest impression that he was waiting for something. The longer he staid here, the more sure he was that there was something to find. So, he flipped past it without any serious consideration.

He found the picture of Armin drowning.

Eren stared at it for a few long moments. Armin lay in a tangle, a wave, of sheets. His hair melted into his tunic which flowed into the blankets. The dripping fabric wasn’t anything like the swift moving rivers of Roa, but instead the thick basaltic flow of Amoria. Like gold being forged. Armin was sinking, pressed down under the heavy weight of the slow flow empting into a mold.

But those eyes would be bright blue.

Eren flipped back to the laundry line still life and ripped it out instead.

 

7

Eren had been thinking odd things of late. He was too comfortable here. At some point, he knew he needed to move on, and yet he wasn’t planning to. He wasn’t planning anything. He just stared out the window, looking up at the sky in boredom. It was odd living like this. There wasn’t anything left for him. He honestly wasn’t sure what he should be doing anymore. Was anyone looking for him? He couldn’t imagine they weren’t, but what if? Then what? Would he just stay here? Could he.

Eren was beginning to feel restless because he knew there was something he needed to be doing. But what?

 

8

“Where are you headed?” Eren asked. They’d just had lunch, scarfed down a few mouthfuls of stew. Afterward, Eren had been planning to work a little longer on his second painting. But he wasn’t into it. He couldn’t get his mind to focus on one thing. The tenament was too quiet. He needed to get out.

“What?” Armin asked

“You don’t go out after lunch, you go back to sleep.”

Armin gestured at the wooden bucket sitting by the door. “Mikasa forgot to draw water from the well,” he said.

“Do you want me to come with you?”

Armin nodded smiling. “Sure, I’d love the company.”

 

9

Eren had assumed that everyone in this city got their water directly from the river. Now that he thought about it, though, he’d only ever seen the homeless and the very poor join him in dipping their hands into the muck. Surely wealthier individuals, if anyone here could really be considered wealthy, had another source farther up river.

“There’s no such thing as upriver here Eren,” Armin explained. “The city built in a valley.”

“What are you talking about?” Eren asked. When he’d entered the city, he hadn’t ascended or descended any mountains or hills to speak of.

“Not a major one,” Armin conceded. “Just enough to slow the flow of water. See, the rivers flow west right? And sure, water comes down from the mountains in the east. But there are hills west of the city. They work sort of like the dams. Now, in April, the rains are coming and the snow melt is really starting to filter through. We’ve got a good flow. But come summer, the waters will just sit and bake in the sun. Honestly, around August it isn’t even water anymore. It’s almost slime. That’s when the plague reaches its height. It burns through the city like wildfire. And that’s not even mentioning other plagues like Cholera and Dysentery. We all share the same fate around here. You’re lucky if you live, and maybe even luckier if you die.”

“That’s morbid,” Eren told him.

“That’s life.”

 

10

The well was farther east, and so technically upriver. “We take it before most of the industrial waste is dumped in,” Armin had explained. “And the river is running well enough now.” But now that they were hoisting their buckets up, Eren didn’t see what difference it made. The drinking water was a thick greenish-brown. It was just the same as the river.

“I don’t remember it looking this nasty,” Eren said, regarding the bucket in distaste.

Armin eyebrows drew together. “No, you’re right. This is ground water. It shouldn’t look like this.”

“Did someone dump their chamber pots down here?” Eren leaned over the edge and sniffed. It occurred to him that he might be faking his disgust. This odd conviction came onto him suddenly that he liked wells.

“I doubt it. What would the point be? It hurts everyone the same.”

“Well, who uses the well?”

“Anybody.”

“No, that’s not how wells operate. Aquifers will get depleted if too many people make use of them. Krista’s mother used to grow very upset when the servants hosted up buckets for themselves. M-m-my” Eren narrowed his eyes. He felt like someone had stuck a stick down his throat. He gagged. “Sorry, my ma used to say Krista’s ma was crazy. One bucket or a bunch isn’t really going to run it dry. A hundred buckets? A thousand? Yeah, that’ll do it.”

Armin was looking at him strangely. A mounting headache told Eren that something was very very wrong, but there was very little chance of stopping it now.

“Why did she get upset?” Armin asked carefully. Something had set him off, but he was probably trying to take advantage of Eren’s chatty mood.

Eren leaned against the well, feeling a little dizzy. “Oh, she got sad about anything. She spent a lot of time reading her books. She paid no attention to us. But every once in a while, we’d get in a spot of trouble, and she’d go absolutely mad.” Eren smiled. The memory was a little muddled, but he remembered it now fondly. He ignored any trepidation and continued. “This one time, Krista tried to tame a wild stallion. It was her uncle’s. He’s the only one who could ride it, but Krista wanted to try anyway. She figured that if her uncle could do it, she could too. Turned out, yeah, she could, but she was too excited and so the horse got too excited. It ended up ripping out of the stall and near galloping through the barn doors. It trampled all over my Ma’s garden. She was so mad, but not as mad as Krista’s Ma. Krista’s Ma…” Eren trailed off, somehow he’d forgotten how the story ended.

Armin waited.

He reached for the memory but found himself coming up against a wall. His head started to throb. The pain grew and grew and grew until Eren didn’t think it was possible for it to grow worse. He pressed a hand to his temple and closed his eyes. He couldn’t remember! Why couldn’t he remember? He almost cried out.

“Eren?” came a voice, like a cold shard of glass. The pain passed.

“She had the horse killed,” he said. “She hated anything Krista convinced. Thing was, the day she had it slaughtered, Krista’s uncle showed up out of the blue. They…well, it was a very bad day. Krista and I hid up in my room. I let her practice on me. Actually, I think that was the time she had me climb down the well. Maybe I’m getting that mixed up. It’s hard to remember. I thought we were hiding up in my room, but maybe we were down by the well, or... No, sorry. But I remember spraining my ankle. I didn’t even feel it, not really. Krista’s uncle her. Ma wouldn’t let me see her for a week. I didn’t care. I snuck out, but even she was upset with me. I said it was okay, and I didn’t care, and that I wanted to do it again.”

“Sprain your ankle?” Armin asked quietly.

“No, go down the well.” Eren was still staring downward. If he were being honest, he still wanted to climb in the well. “It’s odd, Armin. I like wells.” He shivered.

Armin laid a hesitant hand on his shoulder. Eren gasped and shook him off, fingers clenching against the stone.

“Eren?”

“I-I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t know why I said that.”

“Eren, you’re voice changed.”

“…I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Your accent. It was totally different. It sounded Southern, not Northern at all. Eren, Northerners don’t call their mother’s ‘Ma.’

“Look!” Eren snapped. “She was eight and nine! Of course, she couldn’t fully control her power!”

Armin stared at him.

Eren turned around, leaning against the stone. “Sorry, that wasn’t what you were trying to say. I-“ the memories were slipping away. “I just, well, I’ve lived in a couple different places in my life. Yeah, I used to live out South, but I don’t remember a lot.”

“What did you mean, she practiced on you? What power? Was that why your head was hurting?”

Eren’s fingers dug into the stone behind him. “Could we please not talk about it?!  At all? Ever! It’s not a good idea, if you knew who I was, you probably wouldn’t take it very well. I have no idea where my father’s men are, I don’t understand why I haven’t seen heads or tails of them, It’s bothering me, I d-don’t know what’s happening, I have no idea and I’m a little s-scared. At least at Sheena, we got news from the capital, Now, I have n-no idea what’s happening, I wasn’t w-worried about it before because I was going to k-k-kill myself eventually, I just had to get to a pla-place my father wouldn’t ever f-f-find my body. That way Krista…“

“Eren!” Armin was shaking him. “Listen to me! You’re yelling.”

But the words kept rushing out, falling and spewing all over the place. “…will be safe, but I don’t know now because it makes sense that I would come here but they still haven’t found me and it doesn’t make sense because if they aren’t looking for me then they don’t need me and that means it doesn’t matter that I ran which means Krista’s in danger and there is nothing I can do to stop it. I can’t stop it, Zeke! I can’t stop it! God Zeke, I’m such an idiot! I can’t stop it, I never could! Now you’re dead and they’ll find me because none of this mattered and we’re all dead!”

Eren was gasping now. There was a moment where he couldn’t breathe at all. He shook Armin off the turned away. “And here I am! Sitting here in front of a damn well! And I can’t remember a damn thing.” Something about a black stallion and an uncle and his mother. He couldn’t really even remember what the well had to do with anything at all.

He didn’t turn. He didn’t want to see Armin’s face. “Don’t bring me here again,” he said. “Don’ talk to me about it. Don’t bring it up.”

“Eren, what the hell-“

Eren rounded on him “Don’t ask any of your stupid fucking questions! I don’t want to tell you. That should be enough!” Eren couldn’t keep a smile off his face. “Do don’t want to know what I’ve been through. You don’t want to know what I’ve done. You don’t want to know who I am because it would scare the shit out of you. Just shut the fuck up. Shut the fuck up. Or I’m leaving right now.”

Armin didn’t look at all intimidated. “Eren,” he whispered, face filled with guileless concern. “You can tell me anything you want to. You can trust me.” That made Eren so angry he could hardly stand it.

He pointed out to the side. “There are people looking for me, Armin. Important people. They wouldn’t think twice about killing you, Mikasa, and everyone else you’ve ever known. They killed my mother on the off chance that it would get me out of the convent. The off chance! My mother and I didn’t speak. I hated her, and she hated me,” Eren felt tears pricking his eyes. God, he hated when he got like this. He was never able to think clearly after an episode. I needed to calm down, he needed to come down from this. He searched through his mind for something, anything.

He slid down the wall and took a few deep breaths. “The first time I snuck out since Krista’s uncle came, Kenny found me. He said I sucked at sneaking, and brought me into the house to play cards. I didn’t know hoe, so he taught me. He taught me a lot of things. I liked…” He trailed off. What had he been saying again? He was beginning to feel dizzy. Armin reached out to steady him.

“Eren,” Armin asked warily, “what kind of trouble are you in.”

“Yeah, uh, just,” Eren wrinkled his nose, brain going a little fizzy. “No trouble, just family stuff.”

“Eren?”

Eren broke away, gesturing toward his head. “I’m not remembering anything right now.” His eyes were swimming. “I think I might have just had an episode. I start remembering things and I start running my mouth. Don’t worry about it, I just…”

He blinked again, vision clearing. “…which is why it doesn’t make sense for hundred, or more like thousands of people to use the same well…Armin? What is it?”

“You just…” Armin halted and then started again. “You went from one thing-”

Eren ignored him. “Aren’t there pipes or pumps or something somewhere? I’ve seen two, maybe three wells in the time I’ve stayed here.”

“Did you just hear me? Eren, what’s going on-“

Eren laid a finger on the other boy’s lips. He didn’t want Armin to finish his sentence. There was something inside him that said that if Armin kept talking, it could only end badly. Armin looked up at him, eyes wide.

Eren took his hand back, feeling foolish. “Look, can we just go back?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and Kudos are always appreciated! Hit me up at FitzFire on tumblr.


	6. Sea of Light and Doubt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren struggles with the beast inside of him. Armin tries to sort out his feelings for Eren.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, I deleted Chapter 7 because I decided I need to approach the next few chapters in a different way. For those of you have read it, you're obviously going to know some of the important plot points before I now plan to reveal them. Good for you.

1

Eren fidgeted at the kitchen table.

He looked up into Mikasa’s face. She was ripping a mouthful of bread off with her teeth. It was probably the least lady-like thing he’d seen in his life.

They’d started eating dinner together after Armin left. It was convenient, and if he could be friends with Armin, there wasn’t any reason he couldn’t have dinner with Mikasa.

“Armin’s upset with you.”

“What?”

“He’s upset.”

“He told you that?”

“He didn’t have to.”

Eren blinked. “Why?” He really had no idea.

Mikasa looked at him for a long time. Then she said, “you yelled at him while you were out fetching water.”

Eren looked up at her, raising an eyebrow. He couldn’t remember doing anything of the sort. Though, in truth, those few hours were a bit foggy in his mind. “What did he say about it?”

“He said you spoke about your past, a girl named Krista, a well-“

“Could every stop going on about the fucking well!” Eren slammed his fist on the table before he knew what he was doing.

The two of them were silent for a long moment. Eren’s mind hit a brick wall, but there were cracks under his hand. A hard push would be enough for him to break through. He’d had an episode today. that was the only explanation. God, who knew what he’d said to Armin.

He rested against that wall, but he felt a push back. His blood ran cold. Please, not here, not now.

“I don’t think I’m going to get much sleep tonight,” Eren told her.

Mikasa nodded, ripping off another piece of bread.

“You’re not eating,” she observed.

Eren nodded. Again, he felt the beast push back. The first brick fell. He’d lost his appetite.

 

2

There was a beast that lived in the back of Eren’s mind.

It came to pray on him at night. Its claws tore into his skin. Its teeth bit at his neck. It's yellow hair needled at his neck. The eyes were the worst, a murky shit brown that reminded him of the sloshing water from a well that he barely remembered.

 

3

Eren had never seen Armin return from his late night excursions. He would have guessed the blonde boy came back in the early mornings, but rays of light were shining through an open window now and the beams gleamed against Armin’s yellow hair. That yellow-haired blonde boy. Suddenly, Eren was afraid all over again.

Armin looked at him for a long moment, hovering by the door. Eren knew the poor boy wanted to do something, but Eren didn’t know whether he could. Eren felt himself standing on a precipice. Any moment now and the rock beneath his feet could break, or he might jump. But what if it didn’t? And what if he didn’t? Could he walk away?

Could he walk away? Even with his memory in shambles. If the beast wasn’t on his tail. if it was all in his head...

Eren shut his eyes. That was irresponsible thinking.

The well. There was something about the well and it was bothering him. He’d realized something at the well and he couldn’t let himself think about what it might have been. It was easier to fall into a second episode than a first, and a second episode was always much worse.

Eren looked out the window. He wasn’t even sitting at the kitchen table. No, he was curled up in a corner of the room like a small child who’d just been reprimanded. Pathetic. He shouldn’t let ghosts drive him behind walls.

But the beast was not a ghost because the beast was no one man.

…but he’d won. He clung to that thought like a child clings to their mother’s skirts. Where would he be without it?

He shivered as he lifted himself off the floor. The sky wasn’t a murky yellow or an orange or brown. Dawn had passed at some point in time while they stood there. The sky was a clear blue.

“Eren,” Armin finally said.

Eren turned, wrapping his arms around himself. He didn’t look at Armin’s hair or clothes or skin. All Eren could see was his eyes, bluer than even the sky. Those eyes were beautiful, there was no denying it. Why was he just noticing this now? Maybe because, at this moment, it felt so crucial to draw a line between Armin and the beast. Those blue eyes could be that line.

“Eren, are you alright.”

He looked away. “I’m fine. Just a bad dream.”

Armin stepped closer. “How long have you been up?”

Eren shrugged.

“Are you tired?”

“Mikasa says I yelled at you yesterday,” he said.

“You don’t remember?”

“Not in the slightest, but I can imagine how I acted. I switched accents, right? Northern to Southern. I probably went on about Krista and then it escalated into a full blown attack. How close am I?”

Armin didn’t say anything.

Eren dropped his head to his knees. “Krista and I call them episodes. I don’t remember a lot from a three year period in my childhood. I sort of shut it all out. It comes back, occasionally, when I’m under stress and when I feel directionless and afraid. It’s unpredictable and hard to explain. Even Krista doesn’t understand it completely. But it’s always triggered by something, usually something that has to do with my past.”

“The well?” Armin asked.

“I’d prefer not to talk about it,” Eren said quietly.

“Why-“

“Because I don’t want to trigger another one!” Eren snapped, lifting a hand to his forehead. “I’m sorry,” he muttered.

“It’s okay,” Armin said, coming to sit next to him.

“What did I say?”

“You broke your ankle-“

“No!” Eren shouted, flinching away. “T-that’s not what I meant! Just tell me what I spouted off when I was panicking.”

Armin’s eyes hardened “You want me to tell how much I got out of you. That way, you can figure what you can lie and explain your way out of.”

He was right. Armin was smarter than him. Eren doubted that there was anything he could say that the blonde boy wouldn’t see through now that he knew Eren was intent on lying.

“You get three questions.”

“I don’t want them.”

“…what?”

“You need to sleep.”

Eren got up on his knees. “The entire time I’ve know you, all you’ve done is pry and pry. Now I’m offering-“

“You’ll just lie,” Armin said, waving a hand.

“As if I could. You’d know in a second.”

“Then this really is a waste of time.”

“Please Armin,” Eren begged. “Tell me what I said.”

“You’ll go into a second episode.”

Eren laid a hand on Armin’s knee. “Tell me,” he whispered.

Armin’s eyes went stormy with betrayal. God, what _had_ said? “No,” he hissed, yanking his leg away.

Eren scooted closers, putting his other hand on Armin’s other knee. “There are people after me, Armin. They won’t hesitate to kill you or Mikasa-“

“You’ve said this already,” Armin said, eyes dulling. “I’ve heard this all before. Anyone we’ve ever know, right? They killed your mother too, but you hated her so what’s the big deal? You said you didn’t care.” Armin finished his sentence even after he watched Eren jerk away in shock.

“I said that?”

“Yeah.”

“I said I didn’t _care?_ ”

“You said you hated her.”

Eren’s stomach clenched. He didn’t care? He’d never lied when he was in the throes of an episode before. So, was he really that heartless? Sure, you could hate someone you loved. But if they _died,_ and you didn’t even _care._ He’d cried on the carriage ride down to the capital. Had he faked that for his own benefit? Was he really the same as all the rest of the nobles and bureaucrats?

Eren grabbed Armin’s shoulders. “Are you sure that’s exactly what I said?”

Armin’s widened but then he looked away. “No, I don’t know. Sorry.”

Eren let his head fall onto Armin’s knees. He ached for physical contact, he always did after an episode. When Krista had blocked out his memories, she’d been touching him. Now it helped to build up his walls back up again when someone, anyone really, had their body pressed to his. Krista used to hold him when he’d lived in the capital. Then Thomas and Mina had comforted him when he’d lived at the Convent. He didn’t have anyone now besides Mikasa and Armin. He didn’t know if he could ask them for something so intimate.

“Did I say any names?” Eren asked. That, above all other things, he needed to know.

Armin was mute for a very long time. When he did finally say “no,” Eren felt a wave of relief wash over him.

“Okay,” Eren said. “Okay.”

“Eren, how early did you wake up this morning?” Armin said, laying a hand on Eren’s head.

“I never went to sleep,” Eren said honestly.

“You should

“Go take my bed. It’s more comfortable than the chair.”

Eren should have argued, but he didn’t.

 

4

Eren was drowning.

The beast had once held him under the Besa River. Far in the east, where the Beast built his castle, he’d christened the river as his own with a bottle of wine and Eren’s blood. Eren had found himself at the mercy of the violent rapids and torrents at each twist and turn. He’d almost died that day.

 

5

When Eren awoke, it was already midday. He’d been sleeping in Armin’s bed for hours. The smell of the blue-eyed man hung around him. It was the first pleasant scent he could remember smelling in this city.

The pillow was soft and warm. The blankets cocooned around him. He didn’t want to leave, and he doubted anyone could find him here anyway.

It occurred to him that maybe he had died the day he’d fallen asleep in that alleyway. It took a weight off his shoulders. If he was dead, the living certainly couldn’t find him.

Maybe, just maybe, he was free.

 

6

Armin drooled while he slept. It was a completely useless piece of information that Eren didn’t think he’d ever forget.

His head was lulled on the table. The midday light ruffled through his hair. There were no shadows cast across his face. Why was he sleeping in that chair? He had a bed.

“Armin?” Eren asked. The boy didn’t stir. Eren walked over and kneeled down, laying a hand on the blue-eyed boy’s shoulder. He said his name again, shaking him gently. Armin swatted him away weakly, but he wouldn’t open his eyes.

“Get up,” Eren shook him again but Armin only moaned slightly in protest. Eren found himself slightly irritated. Armin had a bed. His bed. He shouldn’t have given it to Eren when he needed it for himself. He couldn’t have said why it mattered so much, but Armin’s gesture had just been a little too much.

It hadn’t been convenient.

“You’re going back to bed,” Eren told him, and because Armin didn’t give him a satisfactory answer, he resorted to desperate measures. Eren scooped the blue eyed boy up in his arms. One arm supported his head, and the other hooked under his knees. Armin made a little cry of protest, but Eren ignored him. It didn’t take Armin long to realize Eren had no intention of putting him back down, so he made the most of it. That blonde head buried itself in Eren’s chest.

Armin kept his eyes closed and Eren tried his best not to disturb him. Some jostling couldn’t be helped as Eren reached for the doorknob leading to Armin’s room. The curtains were still thrown open, the light still poured through the windows. The golden light was purer than any yellow paved pathway he’d ever seen, and the eyes of monsters were pits and shards and swirling masses. This was different.

This was right.

Eren sat down on the bed, Armin still curled around him. For another insane moment, Eren wished he was dead. If this was a kind of afterlife then that would be okay. He could cope with this.

Armin wasn’t speaking. Eren knew the golden haired boy was pretending, but that was okay too. Eren was afraid to speak. Would this spell be broken? Would this light be extinguished, would it turn to some haunting shadow? Or would it burn?

Eren’s hand found Armin’s hair.

“Eren? Please just explain this to me. We can talk this out, I’m sure.”

Was it the dream? Why was he behaving this way? It was so hard to hold him at arm’s length now. Eren didn’t answer, he just looked out the window.

“Why do you want to know?” Eren asked, knowing there was some idiotic, innocent reason.

“Because I want to know you.”

Eren laid him down and curled up next to him. They rested their heads against each others.

 


End file.
